Vivaelamor's Favorite Techdirt Posts Of The Week

from the in-narrative-form dept

This week's "favorites" post goes to regular commenter vivaelamor, who seems to have a way of providing logic to detailed comment threads that otherwise had started to spin out of control.

Picking favourite posts is harder than I thought it would be. First I went through all the weeks' posts and bookmarked the ones that I thought would be worth mentioning. I soon realised that I was marking nearly every story and needed to change tact. Due to this unforeseen effort I am calling fellow Techdirt commenters to form a union and demand Mike pay us, much like The Huffington Post should be paying its bloggers.

The second most important post of the week is a great case study and insight into a niche market where the CwF + RtB formula is working wonders. It scores bonus points for being written by Nina Paley, who continues to entertain us with topical cartoons. If they were available digitally then I might be looking forward to a Mimi and Eunice quilt.

Which barely segues into one of my favourite topics: logic and critical thinking. Argumentum ad temperantiam is Latin for argument to moderation and sounds way better because temperantiam sounds like temper tantrum and ends in rantiam. Julian Sanchez raises this logical fallacy in the context of zero sum economic theory.

The thing that annoys me most is intellectual property interfering with medicine at the expense of the poor. And sexism. OK, maybe I should just skip the Monty Python skit and say that amongst the things that annoy me most are stories like this one.

Now pretend that Neil Gaiman is a unicorn and that Techdirt is BoingBoing and call this heartwarming tale a chaser.

If that doesn't cheer you up then you may be glad to know that despite the efforts against Craigslist, prostitution hasn't gone away; it just moved to Facebook.

If you didn't take a cold shower after visiting Facebook then Mike's advice to the White House may do just as well, neatly packaged into two sub 2,500 character responses to ensure you don't accidentally overdose on common sense.

Even more sobering is the chilling insight into HBGary Federal and Bank of America's plot against Wikileaks and Glenn Greenwald. Worse still is the speculation that it may be part of a larger conspiracy.

In Soviet Russia government conspires against you. Wait, that joke doesn't work. Oh well, at least it parses as a somewhat accurate statement. Russia is winning the censorship race against the US. Don't they realise that China beat them both to it years ago?

The bonus round goes to an article I barely read. It was made worthy by Rose's fearless work against ignorance in the comment section, where she explains why you might look stupid if you compare copyright infringement to theft, but you look like you need a lecture on reality if you compare it to rape.

Re: Tact & End of medical inventions?

"The thing that annoys me most is intellectual property interfering with medicine at the expense of the poor."

A comment which is based of false assumptions. Who is going to invest in medial advances if they cannot recover their investment? I guess we could raise taxes to pay for all research and testing upfront. Lets say we levy a $1000 per person tax to publicly fund all medial research. We could decrease aid to developing countries by the same amount and offer all medical advances free to the world, and in so doing keep our contributions at the same level. Or you could just socialize all medical advances and watch them come to a screeching halt.

Humanity's population keeps rising. This means many more opportunities for nasty bugs to mutate. It also means more rapid spread of pathogens. Old antibiotics effectiveness are steadily decreasing. Bugs evolve. Nature is very effective at finding ways to kill us and it will continue to do so.

None of us or perhaps all of us are responsible for allowing conditions to develop which will kill poor people. Many breed to excess, especially in developing countries. People who lack resources will often have shorter lives. Access to medicine is only one aspect of this. If medicines are not invented then we will all have shorter life expectancies.

In fact, the real problem is over population and that will sooner or later lead to a pandemic. It is inevitable.

For all the talk of logic this comment was not thought out. Medical advances are very costly and if there is no incentive for private parties to invest and if people are not willing to be taxed the only possible outcome is all of us being subject to death sooner rather than just the poor. As it stands now the poor do get cheap access to medical inventions when patents expire. That is most certainly better then not having the advances at all.

Re: Re: Re: Tact & End of medical inventions?

I looked at typical medical insurance cost and then use a percentage of it. The exact estimate really dos not matter, what does matter is that someone has to pay. So you can pay for it like we do now, or you can pay for medical advances with a national tax and there is reason to think that that might be much less efficient. Or we can completely stop funding such research and live with or more likely die from the consequences.

There is a problem right now with drug companies since they don't have anywhere to grow they are only investing in things that are sure and can bring money to them, they don't invest heavily anymore in R&D that is done by universities around the world with public money.

Unlike you conman, those people work hard for a living.

Humanity's population keeps rising. This means many more opportunities for nasty bugs to mutate. It also means more rapid spread of pathogens. Old antibiotics effectiveness are steadily decreasing. Bugs evolve. Nature is very effective at finding ways to kill us and it will continue to do so.

Worried about an impending public health crisis, government officials are considering offering financial incentives to the pharmaceutical industry, like tax breaks and patent extensions, to spur the development of vitally needed antibiotics.

New antibiotics will not come from big pharma because they have no interest in developing those kind of drugs, the people doing R&D on that is coming from universities not big companies, that just show how much you know about medicines and what is happening.

For all the talk of logic this comment was not thought out. Medical advances are very costly and if there is no incentive for private parties to invest and if people are not willing to be taxed the only possible outcome is all of us being subject to death sooner rather than just the poor. As it stands now the poor do get cheap access to medical inventions when patents expire. That is most certainly better then not having the advances at all.

I believe you are either a liar or and idiot, there is no excuse for such comment, but being a conman I am inclined to believe you are just a liar.

The poor can't pay for treatment and neither can the middle-class, is so expensive to have healthcare in the U.S. that is cheaper to send people to other countries to get the treatment they need and in big part the problem is big companies(i.e. insurance, pharmaceutical and hospitals).

There will be no solutions coming from those people, we need to develop our own solutions.

It is time to get all those expire patents and work out how to mass produce cheaply all those things inside communities, ditch the f.ing insurance and create open hospitals that are maintained by the people if we need to pay through the nose we might as well pay for something that we can use and not to enrich a few bastards.

Re: Re: Re: Tact &amp; End of medical inventions?

"It is time to get all those expire patents"

I agree, there is nothing wrong with you or anyone else studying expired patents and applying them. There is also nothing wrong with you studying current patents and working to produce a better invention. There is nothing wrong with your giving any inventions you produce away.

What s a problem is when people thing they have a right to take an invention which has an in force patent.

If you can find a way to fund all the current research and want to give away the results more power to you. I doubt that you or anyone else can raise that kind of money. The sums are truly staggering.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Tact &amp;amp; End of medical inventions?

The sums are truly staggering.

And how is that little inventors discover anything then?
It is not contradictory to state that you need tones of money to discover anything and try to fight for the little inventors who has no money to accomplish the task since it is near impossible to do it?

Even you can't believe that.

I have seen people produce microchips at home using polish nail, I have seen people produce medicines at home, I have seen people manufacturer high end equipment from trash, so all I see is people without knowledge spending millions while others could do it cheaper and faster, we just need to learn how to work together to a common goal, because the knowledge to accomplish things we already have.

Patents for that matter are a barrier, it is time for the people to come together and build a better world that we would like to live in, it is time to bring down the fences on knowledge and make real use of that stuff that could create real wealth and not imaginary wealth based on financial assets that only 1% of the population really makes use of it.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Tact &amp;amp; End of medical inventions?

Re: Re: Re: Re: Tact &amp;amp; End of medical inventions?

Healthcare turism, is not a phenomenon driven by good policies it is a phenomenon driven by greed, the U.S. managed some how to create a system that is so expensive that getting a plane ticket to another continent to get treatment makes sense now and it is not on economy class.

This is what a combination of patents, exclusive contracts and insurance gave all Americans, this is the legacy of the American health industry, drug companies and the government is leaving it to you citizen, unaffordable medical care for everyone that is not a millionaire and even for millionaires you need to be a multi-millionaire or you could loose everything.

A system that is helping bring economic instability to an entire country.

You don't need to be a genius to see that there is something very, very wrong with that system.

Well who cares if doctors get their job outsourced?

Insurance companies sure do not and patients really don't care as long as they don't go bankrupt by the expenses.

After Thailand's currency collapsed in 1997, the government directed its tourism officials to market the country as a hot destination for plastic surgery, hoping to boost revenues. Thailand quickly became the go-to country for comparatively inexpensive sex-change operations, where patients faced fees as low as $5,000, as well as looser requirements for pre-surgery psychological counseling. Thailand is now a destination spot for all types of plastic surgery as well as a host of routine medical procedures. Bumrungrad International Hospital in Bangkok is probably Thailand's best-known mecca for medical tourists, boasting patients from "over 190 countries" and an "International Patient Center" with interpreters and an airline ticket counter.

It is not that it cost a lot of money to develop things is just that in America schmucks pay more for less in return.

Re: Re: Tact & End of medical inventions?

A comment which is based of false assumptions. Who is going to invest in medial advances if they cannot recover their investment?

Yes, your comment was based on false assumptions, like the idea that people can't recover their investment without a patent or a copyright, or with an old-fashioned patent or copyright, and not this new-fangled rubber stamp thing we've got going on.

Explain, if you will, ibuprofen, aspirin, and acetaminophen, none of which are patented and all of which enjoy healthy sales each year.

Who is going to invest in medial advances if they cannot recover their investment?

Not all of our medical advances haven't come from medical research. In fact, many advances of the last fifty years have come from our space program, 100% subsidized by taxpayers.

Where's that screeching halt, again?

If medicines are not invented then we will all have shorter life expectancies.

Shorter than what? And how does that have any bearing on this conversation?

In fact, the real problem is over population and that will sooner or later lead to a pandemic. It is inevitable.

Again, how does that have any bearing on the conversation? And if you believe that over-population is the problem, and that lack of modern patents/copyrights will drive us to a solution to that problem, then why are you complaining?

For all the talk of logic this comment was not thought out.

Your comments rarely are.

Medical advances are very costly...

That's a false assumption if I ever saw one.

...and if there is no incentive for private parties to invest...

There was incentive before patents, and when the patent system was new, so why would that incentive suddenly disappear? I mean, you act like we crawled out of the trees and started picking the lice out of our hair when the patent system was invented, when in fact our knowledge and treatment of illnesses has been growing for thousands of years.

Again, explain ibuprofen, aspirin, and acetaminophen, none of which are patented and all of which enjoy healthy sales each year.

...and if people are not willing to be taxed the only possible outcome is all of us being subject to death sooner rather than just the poor.

You make so many false assumptions that it's almost not funny. Almost.

As it stands now the poor do get cheap access to medical inventions when patents expire.

When they expire? You mean that you live in an alternate reality where patent-holders don't routinely sue competing companies in order to keep them from producing and selling now-expired items?

Re: Re: Tact & End of medical inventions?

"A comment which is based of false assumptions. Who is going to invest in medial advances if they cannot recover their investment?"

Isn't that an assumption itself? You take for granted that patents are needed to fund R&D. At least I was being flippant for comical effect.

"Medical advances are very costly and if there is no incentive for private parties to invest and if people are not willing to be taxed the only possible outcome is all of us being subject to death sooner rather than just the poor."

Why do you believe that patents provide effective incentives? If patents are so important for R&D then you should be able to show that areas without patent protection are less effective than those with patent protection.

The other key point is that patent protection isn't stopping much anyway, except legitimate competition. We already have generic drugs regardless of patent restrictions, but because of patents they aren't always properly regulated.

Thanks for taking an interest, a refreshing change from Darryl and co.

Let's see now: Nina's article was poo-poo'ed by quiters who pointed out there has been a whole lot of free for a whole long time. Nina proceeded to try to teach adults that free doesn't mean free, it just means free.

The balance article was amusing, mostly because the people who put nothing on the balance are the ones who want to smash them. Sort of like asking drunks if booze should be free.

The pharma one is the big misleader of the week, as remarkably we have all sorts of medicines and cures that might never have been researched without IP protection. Amazing to watch people complain about that.

Neil Gaiman was amusing, we will see how his tune changes whem the dead tree editions are considered special and not the way he makes his living.

Prostitution didn't move from CL to Facebook, it remained where it has always been, in seedy motels and cheap rooms. You could turn off the internet and most of them would still be schtuping for cash. Red herring with a side of pickled techno-fear.

Mike needs more than 2 x 2500 words. He has been going on here for 10 years and still can't come clean on his basic beliefs. I am sure his posts pretty much put someone to sleep.

HBGary federal is pretty amusing, mostly because nobody seems to care that they got hacked.

But... but... censorship! Mike's call of the wild this month. I guess the TSA stuff has all blown over.

Thanks Mike for a great week, more humor and more yucks than ever. Perhaps next week you can figure out how to admit when you get things very wrong.

Re: Re:

Gads, you are heroic, vivaelamor. The fortitude required to respond to that (let alone read it) and then with humor and lightness - well, if I had it, the quilters' trollfest on my post would have twice as many comments, half of which would be worth reading.

You might want to go look at the other half that's there instead, if you can stomach it.

Re: Re: Re:

"Gads, you are heroic, vivaelamor. The fortitude required to respond to that (let alone read it) and then with humor and lightness"

More foolish pride than heroism I think.

"You might want to go look at the other half that's there instead, if you can stomach it."

I've been keeping an eye on the thread, unfortunately I suspect that many of the comments were of the drive-by kind. It's a shame that most of the interesting 'dissenting' comments tend to be one offs. I guess it's no wonder Angry_Joe feels persecuted when he's so lonely here.

Re: Re: Re:

"Calling one type of free not as free as the other is laughable concept."

One is gratis, the other is both gratis and libre. One plus one equals two. One is less than two. Do you understand yet?

"everyone is patting the hackers on the back"

Who is everyone? I'm not. I didn't mention Anonymous and don't agree with many of the things people have done using that moniker, including hacking HBGary Federal. That said, whatever was done to HBGary Federal wouldn't appear to compare to what HBGary Federal were doing themselves. If they want to screw around with important issues for their personal gain then boohoo when it blows up in their faces.

Re:

You know, I actually look forward to your posts more than the favourites article. You'll be happy to know that your word count has increased on a weekly basis - I estimate that in 2 weeks, you'll actually be rivalling the article in size.

Keep up the good work TAM, you always provide good weekend entertainment.

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Re: Re: Re:

If we agreed that there was any substance or reality to your posts, maybe we'd argue them on the points. That we don't is telling enough, isn't it? Your opinion isn't better than anyone else's unless you can prove your points. Which you haven't.

Re:

"mostly because the people who put nothing on the balance are the ones who want to smash them."

Mostly because the people who are in support of copy protection laws are the ones who produce nothing (ie: the RIAA, MPAA, and the companies they represent), but, instead, they take control of what others produce (and they take government imposed control of media distribution channels, like broadcasting spectra use and cableco infrastructure use, and they sue restaurants and other venues that want to have independent performers perform, demanding money, under the pretext that someone might infringe, which discourages them from having performers).

"The pharma one is the big misleader of the week, as remarkably we have all sorts of medicines and cures that might never have been researched without IP protection."

The pharma industry used to be innovative at one time, when IP wasn't so restrictive. Now, except for outside the U.S., the pharma industry is one of the least, if not the least, innovative industry. Most medical advancements these days occur outside the U.S. (ie: camera pills and advancements in camera pills = Japan. Sure they have patents but they're not nearly as restrictive as the U.S.). The evidence disagrees with you here and it shows that IP is bad for pharmaceutical advancement.

There is little to no evidence suggesting that IP helps such advancement, if there was, someone would have provided it by now. I've been asking for it on Techdirt for a long time and haven't received any whatsoever. It doesn't exist.

The tech industry was very innovative because IP was largely ignored, but now that the patent trolls and worthless lawyers have seen the economical benefits that tech can produce they are starting to hinder development there for personal gain. No wonder most tech is now being developed outside the U.S. and later copied by the U.S. (IPad like devices, for instance, were available in China considerably before the IPad was available in the U.S. and it's not just the IPad, a lot of tech gets available in China and elsewhere before being copied and sold to the U.S.).

"Prostitution didn't move from CL to Facebook, it remained where it has always been, in seedy motels and cheap rooms. You could turn off the internet and most of them would still be schtuping for cash. Red herring with a side of pickled techno-fear."

Doesn't that just prove his point, that what these AG's are doing is worthless. Instead of having these AG's make ridiculous demands, why doesn't the police use these social media tools to better find these prostitutes and catch them. That would make a whole lot more sense, which is the whole point MM is trying to make.

Re: Re:

Re: Re:

"There is little to no evidence suggesting that IP helps such advancement, if there was, someone would have provided it by now. I've been asking for it on Techdirt for a long time and haven't received any whatsoever. It doesn't exist."

Let's play set theory

The bonus round goes to an article I barely read. It was made worthy by Rose's fearless work against ignorance in the comment section, where she explains why you might look stupid if you compare copyright infringement to theft, but you look like you need a lecture on reality if you compare it to rape.

wow you guys really HATE having your precious ability to steal things, when people call it for what it is !!..

Sure you really HATE it being compared to theft, of the rape.

So lets not do that, I would have to upset your precious sensibilities !!..

Lets just call it for what is it shall we !!!..

IT's A CRIME

Once you get that into your head, you can apply normal "set theory" and you can do all sorts of interesting things :)

Its a crime, so is theft, so is rape, so is murder, so is many other things.

A "crime" is an ACT that is against a particular law, there is a LAW that says it is a CRIME to illegally steal copyright, therefore in our little 'set theory class' where would you have to place copyright THEFT, in that set or in another set.

It is truly amazing what some people here say, and what some other people BELIEVE !!!.

I just guess you think everyone is just as stupid as you are.

But in your basic set theory, if copyright theft is in the set of "CRIME", and rape, is in the Set of "CRIME", as is Murder.

Then lets hear you say that it is silly to compare one form of crime to another form of crime.

Re: Let's play set theory

I was going to keep with the jokes, but I seem to have suddenly lost my sense of humour.

'But in your basic set theory, if copyright theft is in the set of "CRIME", and rape, is in the Set of "CRIME", as is Murder. '

Please ditch the poorly applied mathematics and realise that in drawing no useful analogy you do nothing more than degrade the greater crime by associating it with something relatively harmless.

Perhaps if the vast majority of copyright infringement were committed against women and nearly all perpetrators were male then you'd have grounds for a legitimate comparison. If not then whether you're trolling, or whatever, spare a thought for victims of rape and don't abuse the term. Not for anyone's sensibilities, but because you may have a shred of empathy.

Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

"Copyright theft"? Can you tell me under what statute that's defined? It sounds interesting, but it also sounds like another one of those "crimes" that was already criminal (or at least civilly punishable) but someone used emotional arguments to get passed. Like a "Possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction" charge, maybe. It's safe to say that possession of ricin, or U235 or ??? is illegal. Why did we need another official crime for that?

Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

Re: Let's play set theory

Would you accept a parkingticket that said Arson ? Murder ? Rape ?
No.

Those are four (including the parkingticket, i feel i have to be extra clear since you obviously missed that the paragraph you quoted and responded to does not dispute Copyright Infringement is criminal, just that it's not THEFT)completely different things and consequently *drumroll* have four different names *gasps in shock*.

Different names for different things seems to be the widely adopted standard, it seems to work for most of the world so i really don't know why you insist on backpaddling.

Re: Let's play set theory

wow you guys really HATE having your precious ability to steal things, when people call it for what it is !!..

In a stunning display of ignorance, you've shown everyone that you have no idea what you're talking about.

Neither the original post, nor the comments that vivaelamor is referencing, had anything whatsoever to do with copyright infringement. It was about someone's characterization of rape, and an ensuing conversation about why rape is different than other crimes. I encourage you to read it.

Re: Let's play set theory

"Maybe copyright is not theft, but it is most certainly CRIME."

If it diverts an income stream from a rights holder it is theft. I think that Mike has created a cult of fairly young followers who have not matured to the point that they understand ethics. They want free. I remember likeing free in the sixties. I have spent 30 years and counting paying for all that free sex.

Nothing is really free because someone has to work to produce everything we need or want. Free marketing is a huge con, but marketing people have such pliable ethical and moral standards they cannot grasp why taking the fruits of others labor is flat out wrong.

Now, to add balance, once you have paid for a right the seller should not try to restrict you and only your ability to use what you have paid for.

Mike Masnick and his followers seem to be completely oblivious to these nuances of right and wrong.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

Have you ever seen a TV commercial offering to help you with an invention? I have yet to see one which is not a fraud. They fleece people for typically between $10,000 and $50,000.

This is at least a $500 million dollar a year con game and it does destroy job creation.

I have for well over a decade been running the equivalent of Wikileaks which focuses on invention promotion fraud.

The fraudsters do not much like what we do:) So it should not come as a surprise that they defame me and anyone else they can identify as working to reign in their activities. The vast majority of our people stay anonymous for this reason.

I have reason to believe that Dozier is also associated with http://www.inved.org/caution/isc/, the tip about this connection came from Mike Drummond at Inventors Digest.

Invention Submission Corporation (ISC), now operating as InventHelp.com is the oldest and most notorious invention promoter in the US.

This is also a good time for me to mention that Paul Levy with the Public Citizen Litigation group has generously helped us deal with SLAPP threats from both ISC and Dozier. He and Public Citizen do great work protecting internet free speech. Paul Levy has also helped TechDIRT.

I mention this because if you value internet free speech you should contribute to the Public Citizen Litigation group.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

"You love them so much you let your ego screw up their education. Right."

I do my best to see that their education is broad and that they have critical thinking skills. Just stuffing facts into someones head does nothing to help them interpret those facts.

I come from a family full of teachers and I am a teacher at heart. I love to learn and love to see others learn.

There is no question that our education system is really screwed up. No Child Left Behind (NCLB) has done nothing to address the underlying problems. One of the biggest problems with NCLB is that it dos not recognize that underlying brain function can be quite different between people. People cannot all be taught using a cookie cutter approach, and that is what schools do today.

There are two major problems with America's educational system. The first and most difficult are indifferent parents. The second is totally incompetent and unaccountable administrators. Blame for all school operational problems lies at their feet. That problem can be more easily fixed.

We need to round up most school administrators and nearly all bankers and ship them to Iran:)

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

This would suit me but I am afraid that it is virtually impossible to stop all means of lobbying.

I have spent an inordinate amount of time and resources over the last fifteen years trying stop big businesses attempts to turn the patent system into a kings sport.

I would rather have been doing more productive things.

For one example of lobbying which is hard to counter look at IBM being able to place their man in charge of the USPTO.

IBM has been a bad joke for years. They flood the patent system with incredible numbers of minor incremental inventions.

As if that is not bad enough, with their man in charge they were issued a record 5896 patents in 2010, up from 4,914 in 2009. At the same time the number of independent inventors keep dropping because the patent office services Microsoft and IBM first. This is killing start up companies and furthermore it allows the big companies to pickup small company's patents dirt cheap.

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This would suit me but I am afraid that it is virtually impossible to stop all means of lobbying.

It's actually so so simple. Document (publicly) any and all interactions with a politician, afterall why should they have the right to more privacy than they give the people ?

Back that up with some more funding to the IRS for this purpouse and it's a done deal.
Have the IRS do a full check of the personal and professional finances of anyone meeting a politician, and of course the politicians themselves.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

"Have the IRS do a full check of the personal and professional finances of anyone meeting a politician, and of course the politicians themselves."

If you spent much time in the beltway you would understand just how corrosive the environment is.

For example, a woman who was on Leahy's staff husband is a lobbyist of the Coalition for Patent Piracy & Fairness. Obama moved her to his staff. I and many other people I am in contact found that she is a real scum bag. Someone meets with her and she tells stories totally at odds with what actually happens. In Washington the scum truly rises to the top. It happens all the time.

We have a Microsoft stooge and an IBM stooge in top Administration positions.

There are many honest politicians who really are trying to do a good job from both political parties but they are not the ones who end up with the most authority.

Both our government and the Supreme Court are in the pockets of the biggest businesses. This is a very difficult problem to solve. It is downright depressing.

We need to greatly restrict corporation rights. The restrictions should be proportional to their size.

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Restriction is the wrong way to go, criminalize it with a 5 year minimum at Rikers or a similar place, and forfeiture of all legal possessions for anyone caught.
It's only useful as a deterrence if people stand to lose more on it than they could potentially gain.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

I agreed with you until the end. Also, the part where you completely ignored what I said. Like Daryl, you picked out one word from my comment and ranted on that, rather than actually responding to what I said.

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Hey, at least you got a reply =)
I'm still waiting for him trying to justify twisting the terminology to suit his needs.
But yes, i agree that he is a bit like Darryl, he wont reply to any of the hard questions.

Re: Re: Let's play set theory

Nothing is really free because someone has to work to produce everything we need or want. Free marketing is a huge con, but marketing people have such pliable ethical and moral standards they cannot grasp why taking the fruits of others labor is flat out wrong.

Dude, seriously, you get people to pay you money telling them you will fight for them but you don't do anything, you just spent the money and keep trolling forums to show people "hey look I'm fighting for you pay me to do more", you are the scamer here no better than the Nigerians but at least they go hungry if they don't do it, you on the other hand.

We all know what you are and I'm alerting everyone, so they can google you and find out how dishonest you really are.

Re: Re: Re: Let's play set theory

"Dude, seriously, you get people to pay you money telling them you will fight for them but you don't do anything,"

They do not pay me money. I have never been paid for inventor advocacy work. The organizations are have created over the last twenty plus years are all volunteer. None of us draws a salary.

Donation never cover all of our operational costs and I hae sunk several million of my own money in this in addition to donating staggering amounts of time.

I mentioned the similarities to Wikileaks before. We take on very large companies on behalf of fellow inventors. We have played a significant role in stymieing Patent Deform repeatedly over more than a decade under the auspices of the Alliance for American Innovation and the Professional Inventors Alliance (inventor trade association).

Our nonprofit arm, www.InventorEd.org fights invention promotion fraud. It would be an understatement to say that a few dozen companies which are fleecing staggering amounts of money do not like our work.

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"Why would you invest money into a venture without a patent guaranteeing a return"

It was patent royalties which allowed me to do advocacy work. My interest in advocacy work has been motivated by my underlying teaching mentality and the joy I get from seeing people succeed. It is also motivated by the fact that America cannot prosper by reselling commodity products which are made in developing countries. We must produce new wealth if we expect to maintain our standard of living. Patent protected inventions produce new wealth which cannot be filched by others. No patent protection means that a new invention can be immediately commercialized by transnational corporations in low wage countries.

Re: Re: So what is it ?? Is your education system THAT bad !!

Which shows that ignorance and an inability to grasp ethics is an international problem. If you look at how rule of law was created it becomes obvious that a fairly high percentage of people are incapable of understanding ethics at a gut level. That is why rules were created along with punishments to discourage breaking rules.

It is not perfect because those who are incapable of empathy they are always rationalizing that they should be exempt from rules. Many of them eventually end up enjoying state hospitality:)

Re: Re: Re: So what is it ?? Is your education system THAT bad !!

"Which shows that ignorance and an inability to grasp ethics is an international problem. If you look at how rule of law was created it becomes obvious that a fairly high percentage of people are incapable of understanding ethics at a gut level. That is why rules were created along with punishments to discourage breaking rules.

It is not perfect because those who are incapable of empathy they are always rationalizing that they should be exempt from rules. Many of them eventually end up enjoying state hospitality:)"

Let me set you straight on something. I don't overly care if people imply copyright infringement is anything like rape. What I care about is people implying rape is anything like copyright infringement. The second overrules the first, but it's an important distinction, especially if you claim to know anything about ethics.

You and others are trying to paint this as if we're annoyed because copyright infringement is being associated with rape. It's the other way around. The fact that you fixate on your preconceptions while ignoring the serious point being made pretty much sums up the irony of telling us we're unethical.

Third time for luck: It is not about rationalising anything, it is about recognising that whatever your agenda, associating rape with copyright infringement is a disservice to the issue of rape. If you want to tell me that copyright infringement is more important than rape, or anywhere near as important, then you're entitled to your opinion. In fact you're welcome to it, because it will serve to show people just who you really are.

Re: So what is it ?? Is your education system THAT bad !!

I mean I know the US education system has massive problems, but that simply cannot explain how you people can display such ignorance.

It really worries me to see the great USA being in such a poor state.

And to constantly hear comments from people WHO CLAIM knowledge in things, simply being stupid, or is it due to your education system?

If supposidly(should be supposedly) intelligent adults cannot defferentiate(should be differentiate) between what is a CRIME and what is NOT A CRIME, then I would have to reconsider the 'intelligent' aspect of their statements.

Its very sad to see what appears to be a group of 'dullards' who profess to understand 'things'!!!

I guess an education is not as important as your right to get stuff for free :) or the justify a crime, or not even to understand what A LAW means !!!!.. OMFG..

such a shame, especially with so many other countries placing a massive value of education, leaving the once great America.

Americal(should be America) welcome to the third world..

Dude seriously, are you pointing to bad schooling with that bad spelling on your own?

Re: Re: So what is it ?? Is your education system THAT bad !!

civil breaches are against 'other people' or for disputes between parties, such as contract law, ciminal breaches form part of criminal law, that means you offend against 'the state'. By breaking a specific law.

There is little differentiation between civil and criminal law, but of course you allready know that right, as you're education system is just SO comprehensive !!..

Again, a crime is a breach of a law, it can be of the level of civil or criminal dependent on the 'victum' of your crime.

"wrongfull death" is a 'civil crime' where a private party sues someone else for their actions.

"murder" is NOT a civil crime, it is a crime against 'the state'. The only difference is who prosecutes you.

As OJ about it he can tell you all about it, so he got off for murder, but was convicted on the civil standard of 'wrongfull death', does it make his act any less severe ??

Crime vs punishment

On Friday there was a huge announcement regarding the 16 year old disappearance of a 15 year old girl named Kiplyn Davis.

Timmy Olsen plead guilty to 2nd degree manslaughter and does NOT have to reveal where her body is hidden. He gets 1-15 years.

If you insist in comparing file-sharing/downloading/pirating/copyright infringement/copyright theft (or what ever name you want to put on it) to other crimes then let's use this as a benchmark. It's no less arbitrary than the statistics pulled out of nowhere around here.

If the whole life and future of a beautiful young woman is only worth 1-15 years... Then how much is that song, movie, or book download worth?

Intellectual property is a misnomer, anyone with any intellect at all can see it for the shakedown it is.

Artists create, they can't help themselves and IP has nothing to do with it.

Re: Re: missing for how long ???

"If you really couldn't understand that, the. I'm going to have to fire you from commenting henceforth...."

I'm starting to see the value in that greasemonkey script to hide all his posts. There's trolling, there's ignorance and then there's Darryl. The merest uncertainty as to whether he actually believes anything he posts is pretty scary. It's not often that I want to say to someone 'prove you're a person'.

Re: Re: missing for how long ???

Tbh DH ...
This is awesome, i mean Darryl is obviously a few fries short of a happymeal.
If he's the one chosen to argument for 'the other side' here ... it's gunna be a very very short argument once someone explains to him (real slow like and none of dem scary big words) that he lost the argument.

Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

Until recently, I was the undeclared arbiter of Darryl posts. It's such a tiring task, because he never actually reads anything that you say, even when you use the simplest of terms and smallest words possible.

Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

Those are the best kind of trolls imo =), when they can't even be arsed to read your reply and respond to it people tend to dismiss anything they say after that.
But aye, maybe Mike should create a new usercategory named "Trollslayer" =)

Hang in there sister, we must be strong and fight stupidity wherever it creeps out.

Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

"Until recently, I was the undeclared arbiter of Darryl posts. It's such a tiring task, because he never actually reads anything that you say, even when you use the simplest of terms and smallest words possible."

I tried having a conversation with him once or twice. I think I got him to admit that English isn't his first language, but he still continued to argue semantics with me. I was pretty convinced that he isn't a made up persona but the more posts I read the more I hope he is.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

I wonder if he can tell us his second language and start having a conversation with someone who speaks that language around here. Maybe someone here can prove (or disprove) his fluency in that second language.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

"Well, that explains a lot then. I'll give him a pass, I could hardly imagine trying to argue anything non-simple in another language other than English. I would probably look just as stupid, no doubt."

I tried to give him a pass at the time, by acknowledging that I don't even know a second language and wasn't blaming him for any miscommunication. The problem was that he didn't have any interest in communicating, he continued to argue that what I said in my own language was wrong and that he was right.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

This is the kind of petty crap which has led to so much disrespect for TechDIRT.

Rose,

After doing a bit of research I can see that you are at risk for some serious health problems. Do you really want the incentive to produce medical inventions to be changed to open source? Are you confident that it will produce the kinds of advances which will benefit you?

Mind you, I am not against open source inventing as long as it is based on rights freely given.

But when I look a open source software, the quality or lack thereof for a very long time, granted it is slowly getting better but most is not ready for prime time, and the entitlement mindset of the community I am not encouraged.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

Riley said: "Do you really want the incentive to produce medical inventions to be changed to open source?"

Welch said: "Yes. That is the only chance I have at being able to afford whatever advances may come."

It is a poor bet. One reason being that inventions which come now may well be off patent by the time you need them. Another reason is that you are assuming that funds can be found to pay for open source and that inventors can be talked into giving up their their legal rights. A tall order.

Riley said: "Are you confident that it will produce the kinds of advances which will benefit you?"

Welch said: "No. But I am confident that current medical advances do not benefit me, either."

You are already benefiting from expired inventions rights and you will further benefit every rear going ahead.

Riley said: "...the entitlement mindset of the community..."

Welch said: "Pot, this is the kettle. You're black."

Not really, and other inventors accept the contract which is set forth in law. We jump through all the hoops at great cost in time and money. We are entitled by law, pure and simple. What you advocate is not at all likely to do most people any good. To get the kind of continuous inventing needed to stay ahead of and better yet pull further ahead of what nature will do in its quest to kill us is a huge and incredibly expensive undertaking.

You need to look at the numbers for all medical research and then explain how it will be funded using open source. Beyond this, you have to consider how effective a fragmented effort will be.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

Riley said: One reason being that inventions which come now may well be off patent by the time you need them.

Welch said:That doesn't really matter when our current laws allow patent-holders to sue competitors into not competing when the patent runs out, now does it?

Riley said: You are already benefiting...

Welch said: No, I'm not. And I think I'd know better than you what medical inventions I benefit from, eh?

I am in my sixties and take over a dozen meds, only three are still covered by patents and those will be expiring soon. Read the news about pharma industry's patent cliff. Lots more meds patents are expiring, and no they are not being kept alive beyond what law allows.

Everyone benefits from much lower prices after the patents expire.

Do you really think anyone is going to sink billions of dollars into creating and testing new drugs if they cannot recover their investment?

No, my statement is both factual and well-documented, right here on this site.

There would be almost no expired drug patents if drug companies actually had the power to do what you say.

My statement didn't address the expiration of patents. It addressed the ability of competitors to compete after said expiration. Again, patent holders can and do sue their competitors in order to keep them from competing with them once the patent runs out.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

"To patent breast cancer genes and hurt thousands of women? Weird. I never saw that law."

This is a perfect example of the benefits of allowing patents and the consequences of reneging on a social contract.

This test would not exist at all except for the fact that someone invested a very large amount of money to create the test. The consequence is more tests like this will not be forthcoming in the near future. Research dollars will be spent elsewhere.

The specifics of the case are also interesting. You have a women whose genetics predisposes her to an early death from cancer. She could have addressed this with elective surgery but was too vain to do so. She wanted the test but her insurance company refused to pay for it. The real problem was the insurance company.

The company who created the test finally felt sorry for her and gave it to her for free. It saved her life, because she had decided to risk all rather than doing what she knew should be done.

Then she turns around and bites the hand which helped her.

All in all I have to wonder if the world might not have been a better place if nature had run its normal course. It is hard to imagine a less deserving person.

It is my hope, that when the dust settles that these patents are upheld, not just for those who had the foresight to bring us this specific test but also for all the people who will needlessly die because other tests will not be created.

America's single biggest threat to prosperity is this kind of selfish entitlement short term gain oriented mentality which is way to prevalent from top to bottom in our society.

One of the big differences between inventors and much of the public, beyond the fact that we invent and that we teach via a patent, is that we are long term planners who routinely work over a ten year or longer time frame to achieve our goals.

The problem is that they patented the gene itself, thereby stopping anyone else from creating their own test or any other treatments. If there were multiple tests available, maybe they would be cheap enough for an insurance company to pay for.

And the specifics are not that she was 'too vain' to cut off her tits. The specific were that none of us know if we have this gene or not without this expensive test. Do you think that we should all have double mastectomies, just in case? How would you feel if it were your testes at risk?

Anyway, you're an idiot who is so blinded by your agenda that you can't even see the problem with letting a company patent an invention of nature.

It is a fact that people have for a long time lived & died in ignorance of their genetic fate. It is also a fact that if patents are not allowed no one is going to do the necessary research. It follows that when it comes to other genetic time bombs other than this one that people will continue to die for lack of diagnostic tests.

No inventor is at fault for your bad genes. So going ahead you will be able to die in ignorance as people have been doing since the dawn of time.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: missing for how long ???

A: How can he know it's not worth reading if he hasn't read it.

B: If he thinks it's not worth reading, perhaps he should find another blog to read, or maybe he can even start his own.

C: If he hasn't read it, even if because he thinks its not worth reading, then it's not worth responding to. Responding to a comment that you haven't read doesn't help convince anyone of your position since your response will be irrelevant and look silly. There is no point in responding.

End of most medical inventions?

"The thing that annoys me most is intellectual property interfering with medicine at the expense of the poor."

A comment which is based of false assumptions. Who is going to invest in medial advances if they cannot recover their investment? I guess we could raise taxes to pay for all research and testing upfront. Lets say we levy a $1000 per person tax to publicly fund all medial research. We could decrease aid to developing countries by the same amount and offer all medical advances free to the world, and in so doing keep our contributions at the same level. Or you could just socialize all medical advances and watch them come to a screeching halt.

Humanity's population keeps rising. This means many more opportunities for nasty bugs to mutate. It also means more rapid spread of pathogens. Old antibiotics effectiveness are steadily decreasing. Bugs evolve. Nature is very effective at finding ways to kill us and it will continue to do so.

None of us or perhaps all of us are responsible for allowing conditions to develop which will kill poor people. Many breed to excess, especially in developing countries. People who lack resources will often have shorter lives. Access to medicine is only one aspect of this. If medicines are not invented then we will all have shorter life expectancies.

In fact, the real problem is over population and that will sooner or later lead to a pandemic. It is inevitable.

For all the talk of logic this comment was not thought out. Medical advances are very costly and if there is no incentive for private parties to invest and if people are not willing to be taxed the only possible outcome is all of us being subject to death sooner rather than just the poor. As it stands now the poor do get cheap access to medical inventions when patents expire. That is most certainly better then not having the advances at all.

Re: Re: End of most medical inventions?

"Medicine has advanced plenty in the past without IP."

At a glacial pace. I have known a number of truly great inventors of medical devices and medicines. The amount of time and expense is staggering and inventors have to earn a living if they are going to be able continue to work.

Re: Re: Re: End of most medical inventions?

I have known a number of truly great inventors...

Name them and hand over their verifiable contact information. Otherwise, we'll continue to believe that you're a liar whose most used invention is a series of dummy organizations and nonexistent connections to inventors and politicians.

Re: Re: Re: End of most medical inventions?

Not more glacial then the R&D of big pharma.

They are not even trying that is why the government keep saying they need to throw money at them so they can produce something instead of throwing money where the real research is, and that is universities.

Great Medical Inventors

Name them and hand over their verifiable contact information.

I will give you half of what you want, names of some of them. I am not going to give you direct contact information but you are welcome to contact and ask if yo an find public sources. Some have passed away.

So you found invention promoters and their stooges posting nonsense. Look up what I have actually wrote and see if you can find any reasonable personal profit motive. I am not and never have been paid from any of the advocacy organization I have founded. I live from patent royalties and I have donated the bulk of my time to community service for the last twenty years.

Incidentally, you should look at www.InventorEd.org/k-12. It has been widely used by both public schools and people home schooling their children.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Great Medical Inventors

"And of course you get your cut out of those orders there don't you?"

What orders? We do not sell anything to inventors. We do not accept any advertising and never have. Over twenty years contributions have not covered more then 10-15% of actual operating costs. I have made up the difference personally.

Any products or service providers you see listed on our sites are only there based on our belief that they benefit inventors.

We do not accept donations from big corporations. Several years ago one offered funding if we would roll over on First to File. The answer was hell no.

Invention promoters have tries to bribe us to endorse them, the answer was hell no.

So they hire people to smear us, they try to bully our service providers into taking down our web sites. They have tried to disrupt our operations in many other ways.

We have been doing what Wikileaks has for over a decade in a narrow niche area, inventing. Employees have leaked information to us. We gather it, look for patterns in it and connections between different players. We gather victims information. We coach them about how to file complaints. In many case I personally call owners of invention promotion companies and demand that they return peoples money, and if they do not do so they end up with quality time.

Inventors who manage to avoid or survive invention promotion fraud and who do have a valuable invention virtually always face similar problems from big companies.

In their case we help avoid common pitfalls such as being suckered into a declaratory judgment action (DJ). We help them find help and business partners and if necessary contingency litigators.

If they have to sue we often speak out about cases because they cannot. Big thieving corporations run smear campaigns while inventors are forced to be silent. And when cases settle they usually have a gag provision which forces inventors, to remain silent.

Because of our work, we face an endless stream of bogus threats to sue. We are subjected to defamation by paid bloggers. They post in our names, often outrageous stuff and then they compile their own comments which have been posted under a slew of aliases into blogs or sites.

All of this is why I am sympathetic to Wikileaks and the people involved with them. It is why I sent a donation to Bradley Manning's defense fund. It was a real pain to track down and verify that I had a legitimate place to do so.

I think that Bradly Manning is sincere, young and naive. I believe that he had no idea of just how nasty power brokers are and I think that if those people can get away with it that he will end up in a dungeon for the rest of his life or worse.

Lots of nasty things happen in the world because people who should stand tall and expose corruption, criminal activity, dirty political activity and what not remain silent. In addition, there seems to be no shortage of people who will sell their soul and stooge for bad players.

This is how the Holocaust and many other bad things happen. People who should no better stand silent.

You know how to make a website, maybe you can help your community build a virtual hospital, get in contact with people who want to provide lower cost healthcare and ask them if they are interested in tele-medicine. Can we build something like Virtual-Gesundheit! where doctors can threat lesser problems online?

Color in Context

1) Low bandwidth, we service people in developing countries, the out back, etc where internet is slow and expensive. This means few and low resolution graphics.

2) Handicapped access, many users are older and need high contrast. That means not much use of pastels.

3) At the time we designed the current version of the site the bulk of users were not using browsers which supported CSS. So all page formatting is done with nested tables. Screen readers also played well with screen reader software.

4) Man & Women Power: In have a staggering amount of information online and time is always a problem. We have never had enough volunteers to keep up with everything which would be worth posting.

5) The yellow you don't like is only used in the "Caution Section". It is one of many ways used to convey danger without being so explicit that someone can sue over libel.